World Aquatics’ Post

Governance failure - they fail athletes, they fail aquatics sports, they fail swimming, they fail in the core mission of growing the sports they regulate - 6 weeks before an Olympics in a year that has already featured a half-baked World Championships ... such decisions make swimming smaller and more remote from any prospect of genuine growth... media, too, will keep moving away if championships are no longer championships but moments of compromise bypassed by many of the biggest title and podium shots ... beyond the ardent fan and those nations/athletes knowing they can make hay while the best are away and looking to capitalise or even try out their next wave, no-one cares about this event because it isn't the championships it should be. To grow a sport, you need to reach the wider audience that looks for a guarantee of quality (the very best should be there), meaningful competition that transpires best times and niche aims, that finds a regular place in a regular season, its traditional purpose untouchable. Make this a local gala or development meet and its game over!

🌟 The Road to Paris 2024: The Significance of the Australian Swimming Trials 🌟 The Australian swimming trials take centre stage next week as we approach the Paris 2024 Olympics and Paralympics, serving as the ultimate proving ground for our Agency X swimmers. These trials are not just a series of races but the gateway to Olympic dreams and the culmination of years of relentless training, dedication, and sacrifice. 🏊♂️ Why the Trials Matter: The Australian swimming trials are the decisive moment where the nation’s top swimmers compete for their place on the Olympic team. Success here means securing a spot on the world’s most prestigious sporting stage, representing Australia with pride and excellence. 💪 High Stakes, Higher Rewards: Every race is a testament to the athletes' hard work, with the trials being fiercely competitive. The pressure is immense, as only the best of the best make it through. It's not just about speed but mental toughness, strategic prowess, and the ability to perform under unparalleled scrutiny. Support Our Athletes: As we cheer for our swimmers, let's recognise their incredible journey to reach this point. Their success at the trials is a testament to their hard work and the support of coaches, families, and fans. 🌍 Looking Ahead to Paris 2024: The Australian swimming trials are a critical step on the road to Paris 2024. The performances we witness here will set the stage for what promises to be an exhilarating and historic Olympic Games. We're excited to rally behind our athletes and celebrate their remarkable achievements as they strive to make Australia proud on the global stage! 🥇 #SwimmingTrials #Paris2024 #TeamAustralia #OlympicDreams #Inspiration #Dedication #Excellence #agencyx #agencyxtalent

A big thank you to SVG Europe who published a great piece on how Arena Sport and RTS Serbia took swimming fans deeper into the action through the innovative use of Spidercam and other motion camera systems at the recent European Aquatics Championships in #Belgrade. Dive into the full article to learn more: https://lnkd.in/deRCu9ux #SportsBroadcasting #Innovation #Spidercam #SVGEurope #SportsTech #SportsProduction #BroadcastTechnology #LiveSports #SportsInnovation #SportsBroadcasting #SportsMedia #SportsAnalytics #TechInSports #SportsTechnology #SportsEquipment #ProductionTechnology #SportsEngineering #DigitalSports #SportsIndustry #SportsTechTrends #SportsTechNews #LiveStreaming #SportsEvents #SportsTechSolutions

2/2 “Today’s announcement is the result of a rigorous selection process, hard teamwork and several weeks of consultation. We are really proud of the confirmation of freestyle skiing and climbing as optional disciplines presented here in 2027. Quebec is undoubtedly a national, even global, center for freestyle skiing. And what about the momentum that the 2027 Winter Games will give to climbing, a sport presented for the first time as part of the event and crowned a new Olympic discipline. We confirm once again that the 2027 edition of the Games promises to impress athletes and spectators! » Denis Servais, President of the 2027 Canada Winter Games Host Society About the Canada Games Council The Canada Games Council (CGC) is the private, not-for-profit organization that governs the Canada Games movement. Held every two years, alternating between summer and winter, the Canada Games are the highest level of competition in the country for emerging athletes. They have taken place at least once in each province since their creation in Quebec on the occasion of Canada's centennial in 1967. The Games are proud of their contribution to the sports development system as well as their lasting legacy in sports facilities, pride collective and national unity. The organization of the Canada Games is made possible thanks to the dedication of the host societies as well as the contribution and support of the Government of Canada, provincial and territorial governments and host municipalities. For the City of Quebec and the Host Society, the 2027 Canada Winter Games are part of a well-established relationship of friendship with the Huron-Wendat Nation. This major event is in addition to the many initiatives in place to strengthen the ties that unite us.

I'm conflicted reading this. One cannot deny that Snowboarding's inclusion in the Olympic program helped wintersports as a whole. Participation increased across both skiing and snowboarding, manufacturer sales increased dramatically, and athletes who'd been labeled as 'misfits' and 'delinquents' participating in 'the worst new sport' by Time magazine only a few years prior became household names virtually overnight. One also cannot deny that there's been a price for such growth. The commercialization of these sports came at the expense of creativity. As sponsorship dollars retreated towards skiing and snowboarding's competitive disciplines, these sports - once vehicles for creative expression - began to more closely resemble disciplines like figure skating than the activities which their lineage could directly be traced to (skateboarding and surfing). This transition alienated passionate participants and prospective entrants alike. To be clear: I don't think this is solely the FIS's fault. As an industry, we've stopped investing in the future of these sports. We've largely walked away from activities and events that celebrate/reward creative expression and/or facilitate participation. A lion's share of our R&D efforts and new product initiatives focus on the development of products or experiences that are engineered to enhance performance rather than eliminate pain-points for new / early adopters. And we're struggling with earnest efforts to make our sports more accessible and inclusive. Whether this will be good for these disciplines (and the future of these sports) is irrelevant. For better or for worse, that train has left the station. In my mind, the question(s) on the table are as follows: (1) What lessons can we learn from Snowboarding and Freeskiing's inclusion, and (2) how can we - endemic brands, governing bodies, and media - apply these lessons to insulate these disciplines from experiencing the same whiplash? Would love to engage with thinkers & doers like Liam Griffin on this subject...

Oh dear, doesn't reflect well on the government: "Did Singapore underestimate costs of hosting World Aquatics Championships? Singapore will hold some of the competition’s events in a temporary pool in a car park, with some sources saying costs in the initial hosting bid were underestimated." Well that will look great on photos of the event and the videos, swimming in a car park!! 😲🙄🤣 Apparently this is costing $100m!!! I can think of better things to be doing with $100m! Can't you. Worth hosting or a waste of money? What do you think? https://lnkd.in/gZuGduZh

𝗜𝘀 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝗶𝘀 𝗦𝗹𝗼𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗗𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗦𝘄𝗶𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀? 𝗔 𝗗𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗢𝗹𝘆𝗺𝗽𝗶𝗰 𝗧𝗶𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: Yes, but we are not sure why yet. To all my fellow swimming fans or anyone who is also confused about the slower-than-expected swimming times at the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, this one's for you. There's a popular theory floating around that the Paris pool might be "slow" due to its shallower depth compared to pools from previous Olympics. I decided to 𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘪𝘯𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 investigate whether athletes are indeed performing slower across all swimming events in Paris or if we're just overreacting to a few high-profile events and the small number of new world records. By using the time differences between each athlete’s Olympic performance and their qualifying time, I compared the results between Paris and Tokyo Olympics. This includes analyzing data for all finalists and semi-finalists, as well as athletes who competed in the same events at both Games. Indeed, swimmers on average performed 0.86 seconds slower at the Paris Olympics compared to Tokyo, and swimmers who competed in same events at both Tokyo and Paris Olympics had an average time increase of 0.79 seconds across all events. While the results may not seem as much, in swimming even a hundredth of a second can often define success from failure. This perhaps could begin to explain the public's disbelief in the Olympics swimming results so far. P.S.: I probably should have posted this on Twitter, but I don't have it, and I don't have Instagram, so really this was my only choice. As always, let me know what you think!

Yearender: New world records highlight new start for World Aquatics - https://lnkd.in/dzgHFbQB, Switzerland, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) -- A total of 16 world records were shattered in the pool in 2023, as World Aquatics restructures aquatic sports for a new look and a brighter future. According to World Aquatics, 11 women's, three men's, one mixed relay, and one short-course (25m) world records were broken in 2023. After the former FINA was renamed World Aquatics one year ago, the world swimming governing body has been hosting more high-level competitions, making major changes to the scoring rules of artistic swimming, and introducing new events to elevate the standard of the competitions. Under the administration of Husain Al-Musallam, who was elected president during the FINA General Congress in 2021, the World Championships is to continue to be held annually until at least 2025. "We've tried to reduce the number of events since new president Husain Al-Musallam came in. We believe in something like smaller-bigger-better, or we say smaller events, smaller calendar, bigger events and better delivery of our events," said Pere Miro, sports director of World Aquatics, in a recent interview. As explained by Miro, the World Cups have been reduced from eight stops to three for swimming, from six to three for diving, and from nine to four for artistic swimming. The World Championships was a biennial event until 2019. It was held in Budapest in 2022, in Fukuoka, Japan in 2023, and will be held in Doha, Qatar in 2024 and in Singapore in 2025. "The impression of people is we're having a lot of competitions, and having the World Championships every year," Miro said. "We couldn't organize the events in the way that we planned to because of the COVID effect. So we tried to shrink the calendar. It gives the feeling that these are back-to-back World Championships." A compacted schedule of world-level competitions has produced more positive results in the past two years. "I think, honestly, it's positive for us because it has raised our profile, and it has raised the awareness of what aquatic sports are worldwide," Miro remarked. Artistic swimming will be a brand-new event at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, with a team acrobatic routine added to the program, enabling male artistic swimmers to compete in the sport for the first time in Olympic history. FINA made a dramatic change to the scoring system of artistic swimming in October 2022, leading to a massive impact on the sport, which will become faster, stronger, clearer and less predictable. "We changed completely the scoring system and we made it very objective in the sense that now it's a little bit closer to diving. We turned what used to be very subjective into something very objective," Miro said. "It's very difficult to rate art from 1 to 10. So there was thought that we subjectively evaluated the performance. But we said 'No.' We need

Highlighting the human side of our client's visa journey, here's the first installment of our "Moments that Matter" series. Enjoy as we celebrate how visas bring people's Australian dreams to life. #momentthatmatter #immigration #Australianvisas #peoplecentric

Five interesting facts about the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. 1) Paris will join London as the only cities to host the Olympics three times. The Games were in Paris in 1900, 1924 and now in 2024, while London hosted the Games in 1908, 1948 and 2012. 2) The Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony will not be held in a stadium for the first time ever. Instead it will be done on the Seine, the river that crosses the centre of Paris. 3) There will be 32 sports played during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games and 329 medal events in total. 4) The sport with the most medals being awarded at Paris 2024 will be aquatics with 49 events across the disciplines of swimming, marathon swimming, diving, water polo, and artistic swimming. Athletics follows closely with 48. 5) For the first time ever, the 2024 Games will also take place in the French territory of Tahiti, where the surfing competition will be held on the Pacific island’s legendary Teahupoo wave, located about 15 000km from Paris. Active Air has provided temporary air conditioning for the 2000 Sydney Olympics, 2020 Tokyo Olympics, 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games and 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games. We can't wait for the Brisbane Olympics in 2032.